ENTERING IRAN
By Kambiz Taleghani
20080727
As we were leaving the last Azeri border gate, I called our broker/contact who was to meet us on the Iranian side.
"We're coming over", I said. "Okay, I am walking to the gate now", he said.
Two young soldiers
opened the Iranian border gates as more looked from their guardhouses. I think we were an exception to what they
are used to seeing (mostly truck and buses). They all gazed at us. We drove forward slowly, anxiously awaiting what may
come next.
Getting
the regulation clothes on! (picture, left)
While in Baku, Adriana and Leila went to a shop and purchased two "raincoats/robes"
and shawls. by looking at pictures of covered women on Internet, they tried and practiced different
ways of covering themselves per Iranian regulations. Covers kept falling off! It was all fun and funny until
we felt the heat. They couldn't understand how local women could withstand the heat and the highly
restricted movement while covering themselves with many layers of --- BLACK! If you are not used to
this sort of thing, or did not grow up with it, it could become fairly depressing and old - very quickly!
An Iranian soldier walked forward and looked at our passports. He asked
if we were residents of the U.S. We said yes. We were directed to the first passport control.
Just as we got there the gate behind us closed. Then the gate in front of us closed as well! I got
out of the car and walked to the passport control kiosk. Could not see anyone through the narrow slot intended
for passing the passport to the "other" side. Strange. Then a man with military uniform
and sandals came out from behind the kiosk/shack and walked to the gate. By that time a few drivers had gathered
around him and were pleading with him to order the gate opened! This was lunch hour and everything closed for
lunch and prayers! We had arrived at noon. They close from 12:00-13:30 for lunch.
A smiling face was walking towards us, as he worked his way over and through the barricades. "Mr. Shahin?",
I asked. He just smiled and shook my hands. I guess that means yes, I thought. He took our passports and
other papers and said he would get the "process" (whatever that meant) started and, later, one of the "boys"
would come and report the status. Since we had been introduced to him through the embassy, I wasn't too worried
about him disappearing with our passports!
Interesting,
how at every border crossing there is a certain type of character who is not officially part of the government, but seems
to have access to every off-limit place. Sort of slipping in and out of places as a shadow. I've seen them
in Turkey, Georgia, Azerbaijan, and now Iran. The immigration officer was looking.
The officer walked over. "Een gozarnaameh at bood keh beh oun daadee?" "Did
you just hand over your passports to him"?
"Yes"
"You shouldn't have. He better be back by the
time I open the gate an hour from now".
"Okay"
"Where are you coming from?"
"U.S."
"You speak Persian well".
"Thank you. I was born here 59 years ago".
"Is that your family there?"
"Yes, and near where you are standing, visible next to the rear passenger window is my daughter who
speaks Persian. This is her first time in this country".
"What
is her name?"
I opened the door and asked my daughter to
step out. "Leila, come out and meet this gentleman".
"Salom Leila khanoom", he said. "Hello lady Leila", "How are you?"
"I am fine thank you".
"Your father tells me this is your first time here. Is that right?"
"Yes."
"How old are you?"
"12"
"May
God keep you healthy through a long life. You are so tall for your age"
Silence!
"What grade are you in?"
"Sixth, actuallly I will start 7th grade in the fall"
"Excellent. Where did you learn how to speak Persian? "
"In Los Angeles."
"How?"
"My dad taught me"
"Welcome to Iran. I hope you will have a good time here.
Sorry we had to close the gate. You see, here everyone must go say their prayers at noon and have lunch, so I have to order the
gates closed"
Leila just smiled. The officer
wanted my wife and daughter to go inside the government building, insisting that it was air conditioned and cool. He
said they will be more comfortable. My wife looked at me and, in French, said there is no way that she and
my daughter were going to be separated from me. She felt more privacy speaking in French. Most people
understand English these days.
To entice Adriana, he said there
was also food and drinks served inside, but to no avail!
A short
time later, he came back with 3 chilled cans of Fanta Orange soft drink and offered them to me. "Here, this is for
your family". I thanked him and offered to pay. He was greatly offended and said in a protesting voice,
"Look this is from me and my own money. This has nothing to do with the government of Iran.
Today is your daughter's first time in Iran. She must have a good memory and impression of us. Please
take these to your wife and daughter, from me"
I asked
Leila to come out of the car again and accept the "gift" herself. She did and thanked him politely.
The gentleman suddenly broke into a kindly smile and rather shyly, said "you are welcome" to Leila's "thank
you". Almost on impulse, I hugged him! I don't know how it happened - It was
just one of those spontaneous "things" that happen in life. That was it! From then on, we had
nothing but a smooth sailing through Iranian immigration and the border controls. I heard him talking to
others, as well. He was a nice man. Kept telling others how the overhead surveillance camera was watching him
all the time and his hands were tied about doing anything against the rules.
He made sure our car was in front of the now-long line of vehicles waiting for the internal gate to open.
In fact, he came out once or twice to chastise some other drivers for trying to inch their way past our position.
I guess he had seen all the tricks and rendered his protection. We were simply watching all of this while enjoying
the comfort of our air conditioned car.
A bit later, we took
a walk around the parked vehicles and noticed a Duty Free shop tucked next to the Immigration Control building.
Walked over there. Once the owner learned that we lived in the U.S., and it was my daughter's first time in
Iran, he placed a large (a very large!) box of local tea in a shopping bag and gave it to Leila as a gift.
However hard I tried, he absolutely refused to accept payment. "It is your daughter's first visit to
this country. She must have a good memory and first impression of us. It is my pleasure to present
her with this small gesture ‘not worthy of her'", he said. Persian can be a very colourful language when
it comes to such niceties! My wife and I thanked him profusely for his kind gesture and walked back to the
car with a large (no, a very large) box of premium tea in Leila's hands.
This was only the first of many similar gestures we were to experience during our few days there. Totally
unexpected! I was floored, to put it mildly. We never got "used" to this. Georgians
were also generous, but these people's hospitality took a scale and level of its own. I don't
think they ever see anyone from the U.S. around there.
By 1:30
p.m., a long line of drivers had formed in front of the Immigration office. Suddenly our new-found friend,
the kindly Immigration officer, came out of his "office" and walked straight to us and took our passports.
A few minutes later, he came back with all the necessary stamps already in our passports. Hand-delivered!
To the reader: You know, I was just re-reading these lines.
In many countries of the world crossing borders is a non-event that hardly takes a few minutes. Not here and the
countries of Central Asia. You have to allocate one-half to one-full day to the rituals necessary to leave one
country and enter another. Azerbaijan -> Iran was no exception. In the case of Azerbaijan -> Iran,
it took a few hours of formalities to leave Azerbaijan, and it took 5-6 hours going through formalities of entering Iran.
We were an exception and received preferential treatment. Some others may have had to wait 1-2 days in line before being able to cross a border (e.g. read our story of entering into Georgia: i.e. Turkey
-> Georgia border at Batumi).
The immigration's exit
gate opened at 13:30 (1:30 p.m.). We could now proceed to Customs and other departments. It was a very
large walled compound. Many trucks were queued in front of us. By the time we drove the 100
meters to reach the Customs office, it was 14:00 (2 p.m.). They had just closed for lunch, until 4 p.m.!
You can't get too mad about these things or else you may go out of your mind.
For example, why don't the government offices in the same area coordinate so they all close and open at the same time?
Who knows! Why don't they remain open the whole day and have the staff take turns for lunch? Who knows!
This is a border crossing and the stream of vehicles continues day and night. Why don't they keep the border crossing
open 24/7 as in the rest of world? Who know!
Mr.
Shahin, the broker who was preparing and processing our paper work came to the window of the car and said we have to wait
until 4 or 4:30 when the Customs folks come back from lunch break. By now we had been waiting in the car and going
from one department to another for 6 hours. We had advanced 200 meter (660 ft) in those 6 hours. Another
100 meters to go!
We were parked in front of a snack shack. (picture, on
the right. That is the open window in front of the van). It was crowded with truck drivers. Since
it was hot, we kept the engine running with the air conditioning on. I would step outside from time to time to
talk to a small crowd which had gathered around our car. Mostly, explaining the map on the car, where we had been,
and our intended route to China. However, they all wanted to know about life in America, and "how much money do
you make"? They were also very curious about the cost of living in the U.S. How much is the rent for
a two bedroom apartment? How much is a refrigerator? How much does one liter of diesel fuel cost? Is it
true that you have to pay for your children's school books? How much do you spend on food each month? Etc.
Also, "is it true that there are over 2 million Iranians living in America?" Almost no political questions,
which surprised me. My wife had heard on the news that U.S. was going to open an "Interest Section"
(aka pseudo embassy that is not recognized officially) in Iran. I shared that with one group (I don't remember
what prompted that). One or two of them came forward and shook my hand! Then one of the truck drivers suddenly
hugged me! For the life of me, I could not figure out what was going on, or what type of exposure they experienced
to cause such a reaction! I went back into the car.
There was a knock on the passenger window where Adriana was reading a book. A nice tray with three cups
of tea and sugar borne by the server from the shack. We waved a thank you to the shop owner who acknowledged
with nod of his head. When we were done with the tea I put a few Manats (Azeri money.
We did not have Iranian money yet) under one of the saucers and took the tray back to the shop. Less than
a minute later, the shop owner stormed out all upset and gave the money back to me. We were his guests.
He was offended that I had paid! To save face, I told him the money was really for his assistant's tip as
a gesture of thank you. That did not work either. "You are my guests. I'll pay his tip myself".
He stormed back to his shop. Two minutes later, another tray with fresh tea and sweets!
This scene repeated itself numerous times during our short stay in Iran. I am not sure if it was the car's
appearance and our around-the-world itinerary, or being a rare "species" from the U.S. that prompted such hospitality.
I volunteered an explanation to my wife, "Hey, maybe it is me!", in response to which I received a flying pillow
in my face!
We decided to leave our car in front of the snack
shack and leave the Customs area for lunch. Since we already had our Passports stamped, it was okay.
At the guardhouse, the Customs officer who had "received" us at the Customs' entrance gate, saw us and offered
to give us a ride to a good restaurant. In fact he insisted that he was not going to let us take a taxi because
we had suffered enough discomfort waiting all day. As we were, appreciatingly, going to accept, our broker
appeared/stopped his car in front of the gate and insisted that, no, we must be HIS guests and go with his car!
He, somehow, seemed to know where we were at all times! The two had a nice pleasant tug-of-war between each other until
the broker won by claiming his car was already there so he must get the "pleasure" of driving us to his favourite
restaurant!
So, we officially entered the Iranian territory
-- for lunch!
... and a very pleasant lunch that was.
After lunch, we had some extra time before the Customs office
reopened again. Mr. Shahin, our broker, gave us a grand tour of Astara. Astara is the Iranian border
town on the Caspian Sea. It has beautiful beaches. It was one of the few places we saw men and women bathing,
albeit under some bare minimum cover to meet the government regulations.
Then we went to a bazaar of money merchants and changed some
Dollars and Euros into local currency. For a very interesting story about Asian money merchants Click here or go to the Central Asia tab of this website.
I also stopped at a mobile phone shop and purchased a local
Iranian SIM card for about $40USD. Although we have a satellite phone and International mobile number, we found
having a local phone number to be almost "essential". Besides phone calls being cheaper, it is as indispensible
as cell phones are at home. Even more so.
We went back to the Customs office at 4:30. They had just come back and were open for business. We had
to get transit papers. This is where a bonding company guarantees that we will take our vehicle out of the country;
or else the bonding company will pay a heavy fine. Then they come after us with a vengeance!
We were done by 5:30. Actually, the broker was done by 5:30, for we just
waited in and around the car while they did the work. I am very glad for that. Working our way
through the pile of regulations and forms, all in Persian, at the Iranian Customs was not something I would have wanted to
tackle by myself! The $100K bond, transit papers, and the broker's fees cost us about $300USD. That
was for a 3-day transit paper. "What if I exceed that?", I asked. "Don't worry, give
me a call. I'll fix it. At worse you may have to pay a $30USD fine". Well, later, I ended
up paying $12USD fine for exceeding our allowed stay by a few days.
"How
about insurance?", I remembered the last minute. "Oh, yes". He had forgotten too!
After two more visits to insurance agents we found a lady in nearby town (on our way) that offered short-term auto insurance
and would stay open until we got there. $30USD for two weeks. Liability and Comprehensive coverage.
With that, we entered Iran at the town of Astara and drove South on Iranian highways
paralleling the Caspian Sea's coastline.
Really nice roads. Designed and maintained very
well.
Terrible, terrible drivers! They
seem to ocassionally stick to the right side of the road, only occasionaly, especially when there are concrete barricades
to prevent the driver from crossing to the wrong side! It is not at all unusual, when driving
on Iranian highways, Autobahns, to see someone driving on the wrong side of the road towards you! Actually
it could be very funny watching various collision avoidance techniques developed and employed by the other drivers.
I don't know why they waste so much money painting traffic lanes. Everyone ignores them! I
must confess, though, there was a certain amount of excitement and anticipation getting in the driver's seat -- not knowing
what unusual thing you will witness next! A few weeks later we arrived in China. What a contrast
in driving. In Beijing they were all driving in such a calm and orderly manner. In comparison, driving in Iran
was a loud collision avoidance derby in a complete chaos!
